Books Abroad reads What My Mother and I Don’t Talk About: Fifteen Writers Break the Silence

An Essay Collection Edited by Michele Filgate

The Global Women’s Caucus feminist reading group Books Abroad warmly invites you to celebrate Mother’s Day with us a little differently this year. At our next meeting on Sunday, May 10, 2020, our discussion will focus on acknowledging and respecting a broad variety of experiences with mothers and/or with motherhood. Often and especially around Mother’s Day, we are inundated with messages ripe with sunny, unrealistic expectations for mothers and the mother-child relationship. Our reading for this meeting, What My Mother and I Don’t Talk About: Fifteen Writers Break the Silence, is a collection of essays edited by Michele Filgate that explores a wide spectrum of relationships and challenges us to push the motherhood ideal off its pedestal and see mothers for what they are - human.

In her review of the anthology on NPR, writer Danielle Kurtzleben explains, “At its broadest level, this book is about the soul-rattling realization that despite often having the astronomically best of intentions, our mothers still mess up — sometimes in life-altering ways. It's about how, despite our love or a desperate need for them, we mess things up too. And it's also about the gut punch that happens when some children are forced to legitimately wonder just how good their mothers' intentions ever were. But then, it's about how much more livable those relationships might be if someone just said those three magical words. Those words are not ‘I love you’ but, rather, ‘Are you OK?’ Or, even more difficult: ‘Hey — I'm hurting.’”

On Mother’s Day 2020, we hope you’ll join us in processing this work together, and, if you feel comfortable doing so, please invite your mothers/children to read and discuss with us. We look forward to exchanging thoughts with you soon!

This is an online event, so you must RSVP to receive the link to join.

Event start time by time zone:

THREE EXPERTS DISCUSS CLIMATE CHANGE & GENDER QUESTIONS

Is Climate Change a gender issue?  What are the impacts of environmental conditions on infectious diseases? How can empowering women save the planet from climate collapse?
You’ll be surprised at the answers…

On April 21st, the eve of the 50th Anniversary celebration of Earth Day, the Democrats Abroad Global Women's Caucus will present a virtual panel discussion on "Women and the Environment".  

A UN report tells us "Women’s unequal participation in decision-making processes and labor markets compound inequalities and often prevent women from fully contributing to climate-related planning, policy-making and implementation.”  

About our speakers

The panel participants examining this issue include:

Alyssa Fischer - a climate and sustainability expert,

Dr. Cara Maesano - a scientist and researcher in environmental epidemiology, and 

Dana Powers - an environmental journalist specializing in renewable energy. 

EVENT DETAILS

WHAT: Earth Day Anniversary Panel Discussion on Women and the Environment

LOCATION: Participants will join the discussion via ZOOM (link sent to all who RSVP)

(This is an online stream of a live event; you need an internet connection to attend.)

WHEN: April 21, 2020 @ 13:00 if you're sitting in EST (New York), or (other example time zones):

@ 02:00 if you're in JST (Tokyo)
@ 10:00 if you're in PST (Vancouver)
@ 11:00 if you're in CST (Costa Rica)
@ 18:00 if you're in GMT (London)
@ 19:00 if you're in CEST (Paris) 

If you have questions for our panelists, please send them to us at Global Women's Caucus

We look forward to seeing you on the call!

COVID-19 is making its way through the world in silence, leaving destruction in its wake. This poem is for all of us.

This will be our third GBC Cafe. In this interactive event, we will discuss a topic that is TBD but interesting none the less.

Everyone welcome to join. We had a great discussion last time and we hope you will join us for what should be a lively discussion.

This is an online event. You will receive the connection information in an email after your RSVP.

Our Virtual Film Nights continue with a discussion on the documentary, "Suppressed - The Fight to Vote". This short 38-minute documentary reveals the rampant voter suppression behind the 2018 midterm elections in Georgia.

Watch the film at your leisure on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03DGjnIkTdI) and join us for a discussion with DAB volunteer, Robin Lofton, a social justice writer, historian, and progressive activist who led us through our Black History Month Lunch last month.

Zoom details will be sent when you RSVP - here's to Confinement Cinema!

My name is Robyn T. Emerson; I’m the lead country coordinator for Kenya and Co-Chair of the Black Caucus here. I have traveled, studied, or worked in every corner of the United States, with my last port-of-call and my voting district being Austin, Texas.   I am proud to say I have knocked on thousands of doors, managed hundreds of phone banks, did hundreds of advance work, coordinated hundreds of rides to polls all for the belief in collective power and justice prevailing. I’ve now lived in Kenya for over ten years, where creating communities and empowering people continues.

I’m an urban planner and a consummate organizer.  People of color, more specifically people of African descent, are staggering in the life-affirming statistics and leading in the life-threatening statistics.  Despite this, we keep rising; we keep singing, we keep fighting.

Living in what #45 considers a sh**hole country and the U.S. clamping down on immigration and refugee permissions out of nationalism and racism, I can not stand for its continuance another moment.  With brilliant Americans living in Kenya, we aim to make our voices known and count on issues impacting African Americans. We’ve coined this 13-months to Change, being inspired by the 13th amendment. We will continue community socializing, sharing information, and taking action as a community of African-Americans.  We will make a concerted effort to cast the net wider by having monthly meet-ups, connecting the dots between oppression & discrimination here to the experience on the same of our people in the U.S. We stand in solidarity for dignity, freedom, and justice for everyone. We will exercise our rights afforded to us...voting is our top emphasis. I hope you will join us in exploring, learning, and growing.

If you would like to join the DA Kenya Global Black Caucus, just click the join button on our homepage. Everyone is welcome, and I look forward to meeting up, discussing important issues, and winning some important seats with you!

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Mississippi: African American voters sue over election law rooted in the state's racist past

Gideon Cohn-Postar, Northwestern University

A lawsuit over a Mississippi election law, if successful, will change the way that state elects its governor.

Four African Americans filed the federal civil rights lawsuit in May 2019, charging that the way their state elects its statewide officials violates the Voting Rights Act, the 14th Amendment and the principle of “one-person, one-vote.”

To win election, a candidate for governor of Mississippi has to win an outright majority of the popular vote – and win a majority of the state’s 122 House districts.

If no candidate does both, the state House gets to select the next governor, regardless of who got the most votes. No African American has been elected statewide since 1890.

Republican legislators in Mississippi defended the law by arguing that the plaintiffs provide “nothing more than conjecture” that they would be harmed by this election method.

Media coverage of the lawsuit has emphasized that “no Mississippi candidate who won the most votes for a statewide office has been prevented from taking office because of the other requirements.”

As a historian of 19th-century voting rights in the U.S., I believe this analysis ignores the history of anti-democratic gubernatorial election laws.

Today, Mississippi is one of only two states where the winner of the popular vote does not automatically become governor. Vermont is the other. In the 19th century, however, many states had such laws.

The damage that these laws did to democratic legitimacy and political stability in the 1870s, ‘80s and '90s was not conjecture. These laws were intended to entrench the rule of the party in power.

This November, Mississippi is preparing for its first close gubernatorial election since 1999. The election law that is the focus of the lawsuit could decide who wins. Its origins and the track record of similar laws in more competitive states bear investigation.

The Global Black Caucus seeks to raise the consciousness of our current and potential constituency. To that end, we are looking for our first Poet Laureate (volunteer) for the 2020 election cycle. The Poet Laureate will be selected annually for a term that lasts from January to December. Poetry selections will be featured on the GBC page of the DA website throughout the selected Poet Laureate's term.

 The person selected would:

• Create a Poetry Series to explore societal issues and the 2020 elections through poetry's focused lens to describe “truth,” or at the very least, “truths,” in our world.
• They will be called upon to write poetry on significant occasions and throughout the election season.
• Poems should also encourage people to vote, volunteer, or donate. 
• It would be great if the person selected would like to make multimedia/spoken word videos or other visual media.
• Occasionally, meet with the GBC Steering Committee.

 The poet must be a member of Democrats Abroad and a member of the GBC. Any member of Democrats Abroad who supports universal, unconditional human rights can join the GBC.

Join Democrats Abroad

Join the Global Black Caucus 

It is really important for everyone to read the Mueller Report.  Although the report is redacted, there is more than enough information to understand what happened.

After the 22-month probe, Mueller broke down his findings into two parts. Volume I of the report concludes that Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election occurred "in a sweeping and systematic fashion" and "violated U.S. criminal law". Volume II of the report addresses the obstruction of justice. 

Key points of the Mueller Report:

• Mueller did not exonerate the President of the United States of obstruction of justice,
• Obstruction of justice is a serious crime that strikes at the core of our justice system,
• And the Constitution points to Congress to take action to hold the President accountable.

Listed below are just a few options for reading the Mueller Report. There are many sources where you can obtain a copy of the report. Please use the options you are comfortable with. The most important thing is that you read the report.

Connect with the Global Black Caucus:

	democratsabroad.org/bc
	blackcaucus@democratsabroad.org
	Facebook.com/DemsabroadGBC/
	@DemsAbroadGBC
	GBC Power to the People Podcast is available on iTunes and Podomatic
	https://www.instagram.com/demsabroadgbc/
	https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9eAPLAZHh7FirJD4ET6yJg
	https://wiki.democratsabroad.org/display/BlackC/Black+Caucus+Wiki+Home

Find out how to start a Black Caucus in your country committee here.